I found the Irish Creme Hershey Kisses in stores again this year. I believe they premiered last year along the holiday sweets, so it’s really no surprise to me that they showed up for a seasonal encore. These were nestled right up next to the Mint Truffle Kisses, sporting festive coloring of dark forest green and gold. It’s a very attractive package and has that wonderful mix of familiar iconography and festive appeal.

The Kisses inside come in a gold wrappers with green sparkle/fireworks on them. On the top they have the iconic Kisses flag popping out, complete with “Irish Creme” printed on them in green ink. They smell…kinda chemical, like artificial rum flavoring. There’s a sweet scent to it too, from the chocolate. But neither smell reminds me of chocolate or Irish Creme.

You can see that inside the Kiss is creme colored filling. This looks promising!

The flavor starts off like chemicals. It tastes of fake alcohol flavoring, and it’s not very good. Then some sweetness kicks in that has a coco edge to it, but it’s not exactly chocolatey. The Irish creme center has a subtle buttery flavor to it, but it’s all drowned in the awful artificial flavoring. The texture is also more greasy than smooth, so it’s a very strange mouth experience. I couldn’t get past eating one of them.

Not impressed with these. I found the fakeness of the flavor overwhelming. I think even Irish Creme fans will disappointed in this, so I don’t really know who to recommend these to. Perhaps those who really want to try them for yourself or those who enjoy that fake rum flavoring you find in stores.

The Mint Truffle Kisses have been a holiday release for a few years now, but I have neglected to try them before this. There’s a few reasons for this: first, I really loved the Candy Cane Kisses that they originally released, but since in recent year they haven’t been made with real chocolate I haven’t been buying them. The second reason is that I felt the peppermint ones were good, so I was wary of how the Mint ones tastes as mint and chocolate can really be a so-so thing for me. My doubts aside, I felt it was time to finally give them a go.

The box is this minty, sea-foam green color displaying the Kisses in a row. Inside, the Kisses come in a dark green wrapper with silver snowflakes on them. They’re very festive and cute. They smell intensely of sweet mint, and it’s a nice aroma. I’m excited to try them.

The center of the Kiss is a bright green creme. It’s so pretty!

First off, these Kisses are not milk chocolate like most varieties. They’re dark chocolate again, and I feel this is a really good choice to pair with this minty interior. The flavor tarts off with a mild sweet, minty flavor that gradually grows more intense as the Kiss melts in your mouth. About halfway in you get the rich sweetness of the chocolate and the two make a very wonderful flavor combination. It’s like an Andes Mint on steroids. The chocolate flavor quickly dissipates once the Kiss is swallowed, but the mint taste lingers and leaves a wonderful warm feeling in your mouth. This is nice!

So color me surprised! I really, really liked these! They will replace the Candy Cane Kisses for my holiday candy fix, and the minty flavor is totally spot on. I really recommend these if you’re a mint/peppermint fan.

This is the first time I’ve bought a Mike and Ike holiday flavored bag of candies. I know they release special flavor mixes for many of the holidays during the year as I’ve seen them in stores. Yet, I haven’t felt compelled to try them until now. I guess it was the bright red packaging and the Christmas colors that did me in. It’s just that pretty looking.

So inside this “Holiday Medley” is three flavors for three colors. The red is cherry, the dark green is mixed berry (strange, I know), and light green which is lime.

I bet these would look really cute in a candy dish. They reflect light beautifully and the colors are bright and pure.

The cherry tastes as I would expect it to; sweet at first, then a metallic cherry flavor blossoms while a sweetness grows from underneath and retakes the flavor by the finish. It reminds me of a cherry Lifesaver, but sweeter.

The mixed berry starts of very floral and sweet and grows into a flavor that tastes like blueberries as it’s mild and sweet. It’s a very smooth flavor with no tartness to it.

The lime is bright and zesty right away, but has a sweetness to it so it doesn’t come across as too abrasive. It’s not bitter either so it doesn’t have that awful floor cleaner taste to it.

So if you’re a fan of Mike and Ike this is a really well chosen flavor assortment for the holidays. Two sweet flavors rounded out by a zesty one. I’m a big fan of it. Like the other holiday candies I’ve reviewed so far, these would look great in a candy dish. I know I wouldn’t be able to help picking at them if they were out within hand’s reach!